


one may smile and smile (and be a villain)

by Eirian14



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Blood and Injury, Clay | Dream Manipulates TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Dream SMP Ensemble Angst, Dream traps everyone and it's so fucked up, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Manipulation, Everyone is so messed up, Gen, Hurt, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I am tired but Dollhouse is so good, I needed some hope, I wrote this at 2:30 AM, Injury, Lacy_Star's Dollhouse inspired this, Manipulation, Manipulative Clay | Dream (Video Blogging RPF), Mind Manipulation, Pain, Pandora's Vault Prison, Prison, Prison angst make me cri, Sad, Sad Toby Smith | Tubbo, Sad TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Self-Harm, The Author Regrets Nothing, TommyInnit Nearly Dies (Video Blogging RPF), TommyInnit Needs a Break (Video Blogging RPF), TommyInnit Needs a Hug (Video Blogging RPF), Touch-Starved TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), kindof hopeful ending, maybe multi chapter but I have like a bunch of works going on rn sry idk, they are very pog!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-28 09:46:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30137661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eirian14/pseuds/Eirian14
Summary: "The loneliest moment in someone's life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly"- F. Scott FitzgeraldBut they can learn to put that world back together.OrAfter Dream locks everyone away in Pandora’s Vault, after the world dies, something finally changes. Tommy starts to see things clearly, and the balancing act of life and death begins.
Relationships: Clay | Dream & GeorgeNotFound & Darryl Noveschosch & Sapnap, Clay | Dream & Ranboo & Toby Smith | Tubbo, Clay | Dream & Sapnap & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Clay | Dream & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Dream SMP Ensemble & Dream SMP Ensemble, Dream SMP Ensemble & TommyInnit, GeorgeNotFound & Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF), Sapnap & Toby Smith | Tubbo & Tommyinnit
Comments: 39
Kudos: 199





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Dollhouse](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28589229) by [Lacy_Star](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lacy_Star/pseuds/Lacy_Star). 



> Title from William Shakespeare's Hamlet (1.5.115)
> 
> I wrote this at 2:30 AM
> 
> haha (im dead inside) >(this could be a fic title yk how people format 
> 
> Everyone from the discord servers I’m in knew this would happen eventually. Y’all know how much I like the fic this work is based off of. Lmao I had to ; -; I didn't feel like indenting I was too tired im sry <3
> 
> Inspired by Dollhouse by Lacy_Star. GO READ THAT FIRST BECAUSE THIS WON’T MAKE SENSE!!! DO IT NOW RIGHT NOW
> 
> Seriously, though, go read it. It’s so so so amazing.
> 
> Anyway, here's ye olde angst but I had to add hope for comfort
> 
> TW: Manipulation, Self-harm, Violence, Blood, Angstangstangst

* * *

Tommy knows that he is broken.

He knows it from the lack of sound coming from his throat when Dream is not around. He knows it from the fact that he thinks he deserves the beatings. He knows it from the stillness in his hands, the missing energy running like a rushing current in his heart.

And he knows the most that he is broken when Dream visits and he smiles a big, genuine smile and practically melts into the attention he receives (anything is better than those initial weeks, when he’d been locked in a smaller cell somewhere tucked away and he counted the days without human contact by cutting tallies in his skin with his own nails). The fractures that run beneath the surface spiderweb when Dream pulls out an enderchest and he does not lunge towards it, does not make some stupid, brash, bold grasp at the freedom his very soul begs for. Yet every time Dream strokes his hair, laughs with him, lets him listen to his music, the cracks are forgotten and suddenly it’s just him and Dream, his _friend_ , and the dry promises of a paradise outside of the box. Every hug, touch, speck of human company is like a blessing from the gods. _Dream_ is a blessing from the gods.

_~~He is a nightmare and a curse and he makes Tommy want to take his pain and~~ _ ~~cut it all out.~~

When those on his side of the prison (never the ones he yearns for the most, but it is someone) call his name, tell him it is his turn to speak and shout for any of the others in their block, he stays silent. At this point, they know he will, but they still call his name and leave the offer hanging in the stale air for a few moments. Perhaps it is that small gift, that small sign that anyone other than Dream cares, that allows him to hold on the final, terminal shard of who he once was. That’s the part of him that lashes out, that earns him the beatings and once another solitary confinement (Dream didn’t come see him for two weeks and never let guards by. He didn’t talk to Dream for a while after he finally let him back to his normal room). It keeps him from eating food, from going on a hunger strike for as long as he can until some animalistic survival instinct kicks in and he whispers pleas for lots of food to the guards.

Tommy quite honestly thought he was going to relinquish that part of himself, at some point. After exile, then this; the world was too cruel and too twisted for him to do anything but force himself to change for it, for Dream. With his friend visiting him and taking care of him, why did he still hold onto that old bit of self? He has no need for who he was. Everyone he ~~knows~~ knew is here, too, but they are not good to Dream. He hates them sometimes. However, there is some sense of unity that slides beneath the cracks in the iron bars. Even though Dream is the only one who visits (and really, if exile taught him anything, it feels as though Dream is the only one who cares, in his own way), there is something tethering him to the other cells. Even when Dream becomes his world, he still misses Tubbo so much he thinks his chest will cave in. He whispers Phil’s name when the nightmares scream him awake. He hums Wilbur’s songs, even though he has no clue what has become of Ghostbur. He throws his punches like Technoblade taught him to on those rare occasions when he cannot stop himself from lashing out.

Dream is winning. Tommy is still and silent and bruised and so he behaves. Morale is at the floor; the disc he is given provides him a sole moment of comfort, but ultimately that warmth disintegrates into thoughts of what was lost and what might have been. Sapnap and George reunite, and every single cell is jealous and not at the same time; the inhabitants would _kill_ to see one another, but no one is sure if they could stand the torture of being separated once more. The months stretch on, and each treasured, infrequent visit between Sapnap and George hangs heavily in the air. No one knows when it will be revoked. Dream lets him play Cat and Mellohi one day, and Tommy thinks he hears sobbing. Things are worse and better and all over for a long time. He wonders what color his eyes are now.

Things change, though. One day, Dream calls Tommy _selfish_ when he asks a little too quickly to listen to the music again; it’s the word that sets him off. And Tommy has nothing to put in the hole and nothing to lose so he lashes out, a fist that lands surprisingly hard as it half-hits Dream’s shoulder. The man steps back, and all the old terror that lays buried under his skin rises up and chokes him as the mask shakes, disappointed.

The beating, like his own weak and pathetic attack, hits harder than he expected. Dream was frustrated when he came in; mumbling words of a George who was paying him fake, poisonous smiles in return for a handful of minutes every few weeks to see Sapnap. So he gets carried away smashing Tommy down, and after a few knocks followed by words of stinging dissatisfaction Dream grabs his hair and slams the blonde’s head into the obsidian floor. Suddenly the cold stone is wet and warm, and Tommy’s vision flickers like a broken lightbulb before fading out.

If anyone was watching, they’d see Dream take off his mask, stare at his bloodied fists in awe and then surprise. They’d watch his rich green eyes widen and land on Tommy’s prone form, take in the bruises and the crimson pooling on the floor, staining his hair red.

But no one was watching; they could not, for they were locked away. But they listened: they heard Tommy’s sudden and angry words as he snapped for a second, the frustrated mumble and brutal slamming from Dream, and the hellish silence that followed.

Everyone heard Dream’s shout for help.

Too many pairs of eyes follow the stretcher from behind bars as Sam and Dream hurriedly rush Tommy to the med bay room that isn’t full of infected patients. Tommy is hardly conscious at all, his eyes rolled back and the pain making his stomach sway with nausea. He deserves it, he tells himself. He deserves it.

But as his stretcher is rushed from one end of the prison, he hears a lot of noise. It sounds like screaming and shouting, but his mind has screamed and shouted at him enough that he ignores it. The glowstone lights shine through his eyelids. His head is foggy and he’s in agony. The only thought in his mind is that _I’m such a fuck up this is all my fault I deserved the beating Dream is my only friend and I hurt him and I am the worst I am a piece of shit but Dream hates it when I curse I am a disaster I am nothing I—_

_“TOMMY! TOMMY! WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM!? TOMMY!!!”_

It’s not the voice of the president, the cold, sophisticated, serious verbiage that threw him out of his home and ripped him from his life permanently. It’s the voice of his best friend, of the Tubbo who chases bees and laughs gently and pulls shenanigans and gives the warmest hugs. It’s the only cry that strikes through the haze and electrifies his very soul because someone still _cares._

He spends a few days slipping in and out of the world in the med bay. The next time he wakes up, he’s back in his cell, and he is alone. But the fear the solitude and silence slowly bleeds away into a speck of hope. It’s not the bubbling, artificial kind he feels when Dream visits. It hurts and it burns but Tommy _feels_ more deeply than he has since the fateful day Dream locked him in their new ‘home.’

Dream half-apologizes for it, and Tommy himself nods fervently and begs for forgiveness eagerly; it’s haunting how easy it is for him to slip into the dynamic again, and the cobwebs of the confusing emotions around Dream still cling to him but he’s slowly cutting a path out. Dream still treats him in the same and he still can’t help his giant grin from spreading when Dream enters the cell ( _he’d do anything for human contact)_ but this time around, something new emerges from it all: _distrust_. Dream had lied about Tubbo not caring and that means he could have lied about everything, lied about their paradise village and about letting Tommy out and—

He could have lied about being Tommy’s _friend_. The idea is what makes the shift happen.

That’s the thing: when you break a toy, it starts working differently.

Tommy had stepped oh so close to true death in that cell, cushioned by a pond of his own blood. His eyes had met Wilbur’s, the _real_ Wilbur’s, for a split second through a haze of white and gray before being ripped back to reality with the taste of true freedom on his tongue. Tubbo’s scream rings in his ears long after it manages to break through his unconscious mind.

The world outside his cell suddenly exists. He can’t drag himself from the thought that Dream is his friend but he _can_ bring himself to know that he wants to get _out,_ more than anything. He misses the sun and sky and his family and Tubbo no matter what they’ve done to him.

It took him a few days to pull his mind and body back together. Dream’s visits were still more sporadic, and the loneliness still has the power to make him snap. People call out to him when Dream isn’t around, asking, begging him to confirm he is okay. He isn’t for a while, but the distrust rolling through him helps him sit up one day and sit as close to the bars as he dares.

A short conversation dies out, its echoes ringing hollowly against the obsidian and fading against blackstone. A tired, creaky, hopeless voice ( _he doesn’t acknowledge that he can’t quite figure out whose voice it is)_ calls expecting no response:

“Tommy, if… if you’re there, it’s your turn to talk.”

The quiet settles, and there’s a disappointed yet unsurprised sighing. Then a moment of apprehension and shock as a few crackling coughs emit from Tommy’s cell.

“T- _Tommy_? Tommy!!! _Hello_??”

His voice sounds flat and dead but he’s talking. “Hey.”

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens when the other inhabitants of the prison see Dream take Tommy out of his cell on a stretcher.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> like 3 people wanted a chapter 2 sooo
> 
> there will probably be more this was just a different pov because I didn't feel like writing a new bit yet
> 
> Go support Lacy_Star for coming up with the idea in their fic Dollhouse! 
> 
> I didn't feel like indenting so yeah
> 
> TW: Injury description, implied self-starvation and self-harm

* * *

Sapnap is the one who hears it.

The placement of the cells is close enough that the inhabitants can speak to one person on their right and one on their left, with very loud shout. From his walks on visiting days, Sapnap has gathered that there are three or four blocks in total, keeping everyone separated. George is on the opposite side of the prison from him, and the short visits monitored by Dream are getting more and more painful; getting ripped away from each other hurts more and more every time. The only cells close enough for the occupants to hear are Fundy’s, and Tommy’s. Tommy never talked, so Sapnap mostly spoke to Fundy and sometimes to the person right of Fundy when the fox hybrid acted as a messenger, Purpled. If Sapnap was being honest, Fundy and Purpled we’re people he hadn’t had many interactions with until the—well, until they were all locked up. He supposes it’s some strategic plot of Dream’s to keep everyone away from the people they really want to talk to.

It’s more effective than he’d like to admit. Fundy was closer to him than Purpled, and he and the former were chatting idly. For a while, he could shout to Purpled, but ever since Dream found out about these conversations and started installing soundproofing lining on the walls, he could only really hear Fundy these days. The only things to talk about anymore, really, was how much they wanted to get out and what they’d do if—no, _when_ they all got out.

They talked about killing Dream quite a bit. It’s the only thing, apart from seeing George, keeping Sapnap going.

Tommy wasn’t the same; he was, as far as Sapnap knew, the one who had... _changed_ the most in the prison. The only time his voice, desperate and pleading and horrifically hopeful, ever floated loudly through the prison was when Dream visited him. Sapnap was the only one close enough (and the cells were rather far apart) to hear the times when Dream got angry and hit him; otherwise, Tommy was so still, so quiet. The only sign of life the prison had from him was the notes of the discs he cherished so much danced through the corridors. A lot of them could hear the music.

The music is a reminder that Tommy lost.

His proximity to the cell is why Sapnap hears it, he thinks. The muffled, strained argument coming from Tommy’s cell meant today was going to be a _bad day (He doesn’t know what Dream does to Tommy to make him shut up on days like these)._ He can’t make out what they’re saying, but there’s an inflection when Tommy’s usually begging voice hardens, and then no one is talking so he can’t hear anything at all. If he moves to the front of his cell strains, he can hear the scuffling of Dream’s boots.

Then he hears it.

_Crack._

The snapping, sickening thud, like something has just hit the obsidian _hard._ It sounds like canon fire. _What?_

He stumbles backwards and says nothing, quickly walking to his cot in case Dream were to come in. He waits for the slow gait to echo to his room, the smile to appear on the other side of the bars.

It does not come. A second later, there’s a shout. From the direction of Tommy’s cell. It’s Dream.

_“Sam! Help!”_

It resounds loudly through the prison, and he can hear indecipherable yells from the hallway to the right of their block. It’s a lot easier to hear voices in the hallway, especially shouts, so Dream as good as alerted the entire prison something was amiss.

Stupid, stupid, fucking stupid hope dares to flare in Sapnap’s chest. _Did Tommy fight back? Is he trying to escape? Did he manage to hurt Dream?_

_Please. Please. Please._

The answer to all of his questions is no. Because after Sam comes racing past the cells, he has to run toward the infirmary for a moment. To get a stretcher.

Then Sam and Dream rush by, pushing it as fast as they can, and Sapnap sees the body.

He’s going to burn Dream to the fucking ground.

* * *

Dream’s alarmed shout does, in fact, travel across the walls. It’s heard by at least one person in each block, and then promptly shared in long message trains to the others.

_Something is wrong!_ They say. _Dream is in trouble!_ And the prison has never felt so hopeful, so alive. The prisoners wait to hear the crashing of withers outside, an explosion, wait for long-lost friends to burst down a hallway and free one another. They wait for someone to come in swinging a sword and drag the body of Dream down the halls, spilling warm blood on the cool obsidian floor. They wait for pickaxes to break through the floors, despite the mining fatigue.

These things never come.

A terrifyingly bruised, unconscious, and bloody teenager does, though. Wheeled as fast as possible on a stretcher by the warden and his master. The blood is bright, shocking after the only colors in the prison being black and dark purple and gray and _that lime green_ for so long. But there is no color new enough, beautiful enough to justify the suffering they see.

Screams of horror shoot out from the cells; Dream has to pass each block to get to the infirmary that’s located towards the prison’s entrance.

As he’s seen, the prisoners react.

Sapnap shouts for Tommy, for him to wake up.

Fundy blanches, curling in on himself. He squeezes his arms so hard they bruise. 

Purpled hides in the corner of his cell, shaking.

Eret pleads, then paces the cell until his feet ache.

Niki cries silently.

Quackity bellows obscenities at Dream, punching the wall, even when his knuckles split.

Karl wishes for the millionth time that he could get to his books and time travel to a world where this never happened.

George glares at Dream with undiluted hatred.

Philza rages, _rages_ , reaching his arms fruitlessly through the bars and setting of the alarms. He doesn’t care because that’s _his son, you fucking monster, what have you done—_

Technoblade says nothing, he just shakes his head, putting it in his hands, and does not move for a very long time. He tries not to think about the fact that, in the story, Hope never made it out of Pandora’s Box.

Tubbo screams so loudly he thinks his throat bleeds. He sobs for hours.

And Ghostbur, well, Ghostbur thinks that something isn’t quite right. He hasn’t seen Tommy look that bad since exile. After he finishes reading the book in his hands, he thinks he’ll listen to the urgent cry in his heart and phase through the walls to ask the others what’s going on. After all, Dream said everyone was safe and happy, so _what the hell did he do to Tommy?_

Until the next day, everyone thinks Tommy is dead.

And at the same time, they all wonder if it is better that way, because at least he’s finally free. At least he got out of this place.

But when morning comes and Dream visits and they demand answers, he tells them that Tommy is fine. He refuses to tell anyone what happened. He just says “There was an accident.”

No one believes Dream until they see Tommy. He’s bandaged around the head and wheeled back to his cell, still unconscious, but he has more color and he’s breathing. Tubbo screams for him.

Things lull back into rote dullness, with a few small changes.

Dream does not come into anyone’s cell anymore. No one is willing to let him.

He does not make George pretend to like him, because he tells him and Sapnap that they won’t be visiting one another for a while.

Tubbo is bereft; he does not play chess with Dream or engage in conversation. He throws his food tray at the wall each time it is pushed in. The only words he speaks are ones demanding to see Tommy.

Technoblade has not moved from where he sits against the wall of his cot since he saw Tommy the first time around. It scares Dream.

Niki has taken not only to not eating, but not speaking at all. She keeps her back to her door; Dream has to send Sam in to make her consume anything at all.

Ghostbur keeps thinking about Tommy and discovers that Tubbo’s cell is on the other side of the back wall of his home. Suddenly, Tubbo has started behaving again.

Philza berates Dream every time the man walks by.

George has resumed his silence.

Dream thinks that this is just a setback, they’ll all come around again. The only thing that really upsets him is that after all the work he did on Tommy, the kid didn’t talk to Dream the first few days of being in his cell. Now when he talks to Dream, still with that desperate desire for company, he is clearly terrified. He does not want to listen to the discs anymore. Getting to that paradise village will take longer than he thought.

After Tommy was brought back to his cell, Sapnap calls for him the minute Dream is not there. He doesn’t respond.

Until he does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i didnt really intend to keep writing this but ~\\(._.)/~ here we are lul
> 
> Also I know there will be some changes in the structure of Pandora’s vault and like where the cells are from the original Dollhouse but this makes the most sense for what I’m trying to do! I’m trying to keep the characters as close to as how they described them!! Doin my best
> 
> ik the chapter wasn't all that exciting but I wrote this at 1 am on my notes app on my phone and if there's a chapter 3 i'll do plot and give yall some angst n hope ig <3 
> 
> ;3 
> 
> leave a comment below about your thoughts! seeing like 3 people comment asking for another chapter is the only reason I wrote more <3

**Author's Note:**

> maybe chapter 2 we'll see
> 
> if you see typos, no u didn't <3
> 
> go praise Lacy_Star for being amazing ^-^  
> DO IT >:(
> 
> leave a comment ig and join the discord
> 
> https://discord.gg/q9Vm5wnbF7
> 
> xoxo


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